beautyon on Nostr: What the British don't seem to understand is that there is no such thing as ...
What the British don't seem to understand is that there is no such thing as "encryption in the UK". If this bad law passes, everyone in the UK can still get Signal, WhatsApp and other tools from outside the UK, and there is nothing anyone can do about it.
This has been going on for decades. Governments in totalitarian states masquerading as democracies countries like Britain and France have long conceded that GPG and SSL cannot be compromised without undermining eCommerce and banking, and so have quietly, grudgingly relented and shrunk away from trying to control those universal tools.
Damien Green is famous for organising the unethical seizure of Facebook company documents:
https://archive.is/wip/ikBWC
and so any pretence that Britain is a democracy where the rule of law is in place is absurd on its face, as is the idea that there will be proper controls over who gets to look at private Signal messages. They can "seize" anything they like at any time, without a warrant, believe it or not. And then they BOAST about it:
https://twitter.com/DamianCollins/status/1066613739607261185?s=20
No one in their right mind believes any assurances given by any State when it comes to self control about reading other people's messages. That's just one aspect.
The other aspect is this. No American company will cripple their software at the behest of the Saudi Arabian government. They will continue to make their apps available unrestricted and unfettered, and there is nothing anyone anywhere can do about it.
As long as this is true, anyone anywhere on earth can install an unmodified copy of Signal, and it will not be possible for any State to control the billions of people who are using those apps. It will not be possible for them to know that the apps are being used at all.
The world has changed, and gentlemen like Damien Green are having a hard time coming to terms with it. All the arguments they're able to mount to do with porn and other bad things have been used for decades without any effect. Anyone can Google the Crypto Wars and see that the arguments are exactly the same today as they were in the past.
Read this which deals with this subject from 1985. There is even a physiognomic clone of Gargoyle Gary Gensler taking the side of censorship and fear mongering.
https://medium.com/@beautyon_/bitcoin-parallels-from-1985-1cb70ca130a4
If the British pass this law, all it will do is further impoverish the people there. They've already all but extinguished Bitcoin businesses in the UK; they're going to make sure that no one starting any sort of business running on the prerequisite of unbroken encryption software or the Bitcoin chain of blocks considers Britain, not even as a bad joke.
America (even with its serious problems) and new Super Contestant entrants like El Salvador will continue to hoover up all the software talent of the world, allow people to launch secure and strong services, and there is nothing INGSOC can do about it. All they can do is make impotent gestures like this scabrous, scandalous, toxic bill that no one will obey and that will cause all developers to run to Heathrow.
The fact of the matter is that these entrepreneurs fleeing Britain will be going to places that have large pools of talent made up of fellow escapees from all over the world, who have moved to where the work and innovation are. If there is no innovation in Britain, no one will set up companies there and no one will be hired there. Everything will move to free countries.
Once the seeds are planted in other countries, it will be nearly impossible to coax entrepreneurs to "Move to Silicon Roundabout" without getting laughed out of the room:
https://medium.com/swlh/priti-patel-is-wrong-about-encryption-5bbfaab62cc1
Britain is finished as a possible "International Tech Hub". They did it to themselves, refuse to take proper advice, and now everyone is leaving. The very fact that this bill is even being discussed is stopping people from considering anything there.
So Long, and Thanks for All the Fish!
https://twitter.com/BigBrotherWatch/status/1676164328146305026
This has been going on for decades. Governments in totalitarian states masquerading as democracies countries like Britain and France have long conceded that GPG and SSL cannot be compromised without undermining eCommerce and banking, and so have quietly, grudgingly relented and shrunk away from trying to control those universal tools.
Damien Green is famous for organising the unethical seizure of Facebook company documents:
https://archive.is/wip/ikBWC
and so any pretence that Britain is a democracy where the rule of law is in place is absurd on its face, as is the idea that there will be proper controls over who gets to look at private Signal messages. They can "seize" anything they like at any time, without a warrant, believe it or not. And then they BOAST about it:
https://twitter.com/DamianCollins/status/1066613739607261185?s=20
No one in their right mind believes any assurances given by any State when it comes to self control about reading other people's messages. That's just one aspect.
The other aspect is this. No American company will cripple their software at the behest of the Saudi Arabian government. They will continue to make their apps available unrestricted and unfettered, and there is nothing anyone anywhere can do about it.
As long as this is true, anyone anywhere on earth can install an unmodified copy of Signal, and it will not be possible for any State to control the billions of people who are using those apps. It will not be possible for them to know that the apps are being used at all.
The world has changed, and gentlemen like Damien Green are having a hard time coming to terms with it. All the arguments they're able to mount to do with porn and other bad things have been used for decades without any effect. Anyone can Google the Crypto Wars and see that the arguments are exactly the same today as they were in the past.
Read this which deals with this subject from 1985. There is even a physiognomic clone of Gargoyle Gary Gensler taking the side of censorship and fear mongering.
https://medium.com/@beautyon_/bitcoin-parallels-from-1985-1cb70ca130a4
If the British pass this law, all it will do is further impoverish the people there. They've already all but extinguished Bitcoin businesses in the UK; they're going to make sure that no one starting any sort of business running on the prerequisite of unbroken encryption software or the Bitcoin chain of blocks considers Britain, not even as a bad joke.
America (even with its serious problems) and new Super Contestant entrants like El Salvador will continue to hoover up all the software talent of the world, allow people to launch secure and strong services, and there is nothing INGSOC can do about it. All they can do is make impotent gestures like this scabrous, scandalous, toxic bill that no one will obey and that will cause all developers to run to Heathrow.
The fact of the matter is that these entrepreneurs fleeing Britain will be going to places that have large pools of talent made up of fellow escapees from all over the world, who have moved to where the work and innovation are. If there is no innovation in Britain, no one will set up companies there and no one will be hired there. Everything will move to free countries.
Once the seeds are planted in other countries, it will be nearly impossible to coax entrepreneurs to "Move to Silicon Roundabout" without getting laughed out of the room:
https://medium.com/swlh/priti-patel-is-wrong-about-encryption-5bbfaab62cc1
Britain is finished as a possible "International Tech Hub". They did it to themselves, refuse to take proper advice, and now everyone is leaving. The very fact that this bill is even being discussed is stopping people from considering anything there.
So Long, and Thanks for All the Fish!
https://twitter.com/BigBrotherWatch/status/1676164328146305026